Blissfield's Farm to Table event to raise funds for museum

BLISSFIELD — The Farm to Table event set for Saturday, Aug. 5, is the first public event at the site of the American Farm Museum and Education Center

The 5 to 9-p.m. event will offer a dinner of locally sourced ingredients prepared by Jake Graf of the Lenawee Intermediate School District culinary program at the Hathaway House as well as music by the Copper Stills Band of Hanover. All of it will happen at the center’s site, 420 E. Jefferson St.

That place officially did not become the home for the American Farm Museum and Education Center until closing papers were signed in May.

This event, however, has been in the works for a year, with plans being made in earnest starting in January, according to executive board member Melissa Growden of Berkey, Ohio.

“What we hope,” she said, “is that this will become a significant event on an annual basis.”

The event has attracted an array of support, she said, especially from a number of sponsors, such as the Hathaway House and Tents of Tecumseh, which is providing tents, tables and chairs for the event. “We need to be under tents,” Growden said, even though the forecast is for mild weather.

The support also has come in the form of those willing to buy tickets to the event — the cost is $65 per person or $500 for a table in advance, $75 at the door on the day of the event. Reservations were pushing 200 as of Thursday morning; the facility can handle 250 people.

“That is pretty incredible,” Growden said, “considering this is our first year.”

The level of sponsorship and the level of ticket sales, she added, “proves to our board that we are doing the right thing.

“It is just going to be a fantastic party.”

The event is the first fundraiser for the center, which Growden said will need between $1 million and $1.5 million to fund the site preparation and first phase of four phases of development. The museum’s board paid the village of Blissfield $225,000 for the 4.5-acre site.

The first phase will prepare the site and construct a storage building. The second phase calls for the addition of an education center and a first gallery, as well as parking. The third phase includes a multipurpose building and a second gallery. The final phase will include a third and fourth gallery. The total costs, at the present, is estimated at $10 million.

The society plans a campus-style layout so the property can be developed in stages.

The board contracted with Friedich St. Florian to design the museum. St. Florian’s design uses the look a barn as the basis for the buildings.

A centerpiece of the museum will be a 13,000-piece collection of farm toys — including more than 360 pedal tractors — deeded to the society in 2012 by Charles and Barbara Burkholder of Blissfield. He died in 2014, and she passed away in 2015. The family has several barns filled with cast-iron farm toys, pedal tractors and other antique farm machinery ready to be part of a museum.

The educational side of the museum, added to the plans in 2015, will provide information concerning food production, with rotating displays in both the museum and educational center. The museum will engage visitors through multidimensional displays and demonstrations.

The museum also would include artifacts illustrating the history of agriculture and interactive exhibits allowing people to try their skills at a number of agricultural tasks. Because the property is adjacent to farmland, a demonstration farm and classroom setting eventually might be included in the complex.